1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to advanced telephony services.
2. Description of the Related Art
Modern telephone call processing systems have enabled users to take advantage of many advanced telephony services. For example, the publicly switched telephone network (PSTN) now incorporates technology to allow users to take advantage of advanced services to make collect calls, calling card calls, debit card calls, etc. Often, these and other advanced services have been made possible through implementation and use of Intelligent Services Network (ISN) systems that are coupled to the PSTN. Such ISN systems include sophisticated computer and data processing systems and associated peripherals.
Although there has been wide-spread use of ISN systems within the PSTN to provide advanced telephony services, other technologies have been developed which are quickly becoming recognized for their ability to support telephony communications. For example, the proliferation of the Internet has given rise to Internet-based telephony systems. These systems allow a user along with his personal computer to operate a client software program (i.e., a World Wide Web “WWW” browser) to access an Internet site to engage in Internet telephony. The accessed Internet site typically includes a central server that acts as a hub to process and deliver digital streams (e.g., packet data representative of a user's voice) to another user that waits for the same. In essence, a call may be established via the central telephony server if the calling party and the called party are both available and ready to communicate. Unfortunately, however, such Internet-based telephony systems do not allow users to place calls to parties outside of the Internet such as parties that are coupled to the PSTN. Moreover, such Internet telephony systems do not offer advanced call processing services that PSTN users have come to enjoy and expect as a result of the use of ISN systems.
Accordingly, Internet telephony service providers face a significant problem in terms of how to implement advanced telephony services like those that are already available to users of the PSTN (e.g., collect call services, calling card services, etc.). At the same, ISN-based service providers also face a problem in that they have made significant investments in their ISN systems that do not presently incorporate links to Internet-based telephony technologies. As a result, users have no way of placing calls via the Internet which are destined for call termination locations that are coupled to other telecommunications networks such as the PSTN.
Thus, there exists a need to provide a system wherein telephone calls may originate via the Internet and be routed to call termination locations that are coupled to the PSTN. In order to be commercially feasible, such a system must allow calls that originate via the Internet to be provided with advanced telephony services such as collect call services, calling card services, debit card services, etc. Without such a system, Internet telephony users will not be able to take advantage of the advanced services and telephony features that are already available to the users of the PSTN. Moreover, in the absence of such a system, two distinct telecommunications systems will exist with no way to bridge the same to realize new and heightened levels of communication.